Landscaping: Birds flock to winter restaurants

After they've finished cheering up your garden, common perennials, including black-eyed susans, will provide seed for birds.

My eco-warrior mate Mike gets snaky when I crow about the number of birds in our garden. He can't understand why I have just as many as he does, despite indulging myself with three cats and a dog.

It would be naive of me to think the cats don't catch birds: however, the Oriental is too elegant to hunt, the part-Burmese specialises in mice and rabbits, and it's only the brain-damaged spotted tabby that snatches the occasional winged creature, if it flies past at low altitude and low speed with its eyes closed.

So there are always tui, rosellas, thrushes, kingfishers, fantails, quail, pheasants, ducks, and plenty more whose names I'm unsure of. The dawn chorus is deafening and, like my neighbour's rooster, goes on pretty much all day. I'm loving it, so I'm encouraging new members of the choir by providing breakfast.

There are two ways of feeding birds in the winter. When you're planting, choose things that have seedheads that remain through winter. Common perennials like black-eyed susans, coneflowers and asters provide seeds, and deciduous shrubs like viburnum provide berries.

If you're not up to speed with that yet, you can supplement whatever natural food is around by using bird feeders. I used to just throw breadcrumbs and seeds on the ground but the part-Burmese, who should be morbidly obese but isn't, always got to them first. It was side-splitting to see him happily eating wild bird seed and stale muesli with the ducks.

So this year it's bird feeders, held high off the ground on a skinny pole. Various feeders are available - platforms, tubes, hoppers, nets - and if you want the birds to get the food you put out, you have to present it appropriately. A bird's bill and feet generally dictate the type of food and feeder it needs.

The greater the variety of feeders you provide, the greater will be the variety of choir members. Tube feeders typically attract finches, larger birds often go for platform feeders, and a net feeder filled with suet and peanut butter (yum) will find plenty of takers.

Making a designer feeder will engage your creativity as well as supplement winter feed for birds, and a net feeder filled with suet and peanut butter will be a popular item.

The most versatile seed is the black-oil sunflower seed. You can mix it with peanut butter and put it in a suet feeder, or use it in hoppers and on platforms. Niger (thistle seed) is used in tube feeders. These tiny seeds are a favourite with finches. Combinations of black sunflower seeds, nuts, and dried fruit will also be well received.

To extend the menu, check out the bird food recipes at forestandbird.org.nz (backyard projects).

Providing water is also a good idea. If you want them to view your property as a five-star hotel, make a heated birdbath. You can buy solar models or have a go at making your own. They need to be shallow and, as in any good hotel, clean. Clean feeders and baths regularly. Be consistent with feeding. In a way you're training your birds to expect supplemental food in winter, and they'll be confused if the restaurant suddenly closes.

Unlikely friends are charmers

Brother and sister team Tania and Chris Norfolk collaborated on this sweet children's book about a grasshopper, a tree and the days of the week.

It's beautifully illustrated by Chris and his charming pictures are accompanied by Tania's equally charming, evocative text: "And in the wind, Grasshopper could smell old leaves and lost secrets and forgotten ice." Tania, a librarian and information literacy tutor in Nelson, says the small and the everyday are a rich source of inspiration. Chris, who lives in Invercargill, has worked in a wide range of artistic media including book illustration. He has often used chalk pastel in his illustration work and it was an obvious medium for Grasshopper's Week.